“Dr. Chaps” Loves Cory Gardner’s Life At Conception Act

Yesterday saw a new lengthy email missive from Republican HD-15 nominee Gordon "Dr. Chaps" Klingenschmitt, whose wild rhetoric before and after winning the Republican primary to succeed former House Minority Leader Mark Waller has been making national headlines. Klingenschmitt's recent suggestion that openly gay Rep. Jared Polis was ready to start "beheading Christians" "in America" led to calls by Democrats for Klingenschmitt to withdraw from the HD-15 race–a call that tellingly was not picked up by Republicans like Waller or the chairman of the EL Paso County GOP.

In Klingenschmitt's latest email blast, there's no reference to Democrats beheading Christians. But while trying to watch what he says, "Dr. Chaps" still manages to leave his fellow Republicans in the hot seat:

The U.S. Senator from Kentucky, Rand Paul (R) has introduced the "Life Begins At Conception Act" Senate Bill S. 583, which is modeled after "Personhood" legislation we supported in ballot initiatives in Mississippi, Colorado, and Florida. [Pols emphasis]

The pro-life legislation simply applies the protections of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to unborn children, by defining them as "persons." Personhood is a legal strategy that can potentially overturn Roe v. Wade and stop the abortion holocaust in America, as predicted by Justice Blackmun who wrote the 1973 ruling: "If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant’s case, of course, collapses, for the fetus’ right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the [14th] Amendment."

S. 583, Sen. Rand Paul's Life at Conception Act, is the Senate's companion measure to H.R. 1091, the Life at Conception Act co-sponsored by…yes, that's right, U.S. Senate candidate Cory Gardner! As our readers know, Gardner's campaign has claimed that H.R. 1091 does not have the same effect as the Personhood abortion bans that Gardner disavowed support for right after jumping in the Senate race. Factcheck.org and experts on the issue have responded that Gardner's distinction between the Colorado Personhood initiatives and the federal Life at Conception Act is bogus–the same language conferring rights to a fetus from "the moment of fertilization" in both proposals is what would have the effect of banning all abortions even in cases of rape or incest, as well as certain forms of so-called "abortifacient" birth control. Gardner has not responded anywhere that we've found to Factcheck.org's debunking of this key claim, presumably because, as we've explored at length, there is no good response.

And as you can see, "Dr. Chaps" agrees! Though we doubt Gardner will appreciate the clarification.

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Obviously, the entire purpose of this stupid blog post is to make a picture of Gardner and Klingenschmitt together.

But it's not the same bill, and who cares what Chaps says? Colorado Pols only does when they can use him against other Republicans. Your stupid gotcha games will not save Udall. 538 now has Gardner WINNING THE RACE.

Zippy, theres' not a dime's worh of difference between Chaps and Con Man Cory, or between Con Man's federal personahood propsal vs. the CO personhood propsoal he still supports — NO MATTER WHAT HE NOW FALSELY CLAIMS FOR POLITICAL EXPEDIENCY.

As for 538, please, do cling to that POS. Now when and if Sam Wang says Gardner's a lock, get back to us, Until then, you're still just as ignorant. self-deluded and foolish (and inefectual) as ever.

No, Moddy, FiveThrityEight doesn't "have Gardner WINNING." It has the race as a tossup (you have to read the stuff with the letters and words and not just look at the pretty pictures). Their model says, with 90% confidence, that the vote will be somewhere between Udall +10 and Cardinal Asshat +11.

and an excellent description of their model from Mr. Silver (warning long, and only part 1). For the tl;dr crowd, notes about Colorado:

In Iowa, Colorado and Alaska, for example, we have Democrats very narrowly favored on the basis of the raw polling average — but their edge is so narrow that Republicans pull ahead slightly if we adjust the registered-voter polls in these states to a likely-voter basis.

The quality and quantity of polling has been poor. We have stunningly few polls in some states. In Colorado, for example, which could easily determine the balance of the Senate, no polls at all were published in August. And in many states, most of the polls we do have are from non-traditional polling firms, including those that conduct “robopolls” or Internet polls, or which have an explicitly partisan affiliation.

Four more Democratic-held seats — in Alaska, Colorado, Iowa and North Carolina — rate as tossups.

At the risk of leading us further astray from Two Men and a Zygote, the NYT has a nice election model comparison page. I think that WaPo has some polsters on some profound intoxicants, but we'll know in a couple months.

And who cares what Chaps says? Apparently a good part of your base. The problem is the pragmatic side of your party (i.e., winning takes precedent over purity) sees correctly as the embarrassment that he is.

You can't have it both ways, Moddy. You've got take your nutters if you also want their votes.